If it is all life, then the goal becomes integration: bringing the same qualities—presence, clarity, and care—into meetings, commutes, family time, and solitude. Philosophically, this echoes traditions that treat ordinary activity as a site of practice; for example, the Bhagavad Gita frames action as meaningful when done with steadiness and right orientation rather than compulsive attachment (Bhagavad Gita, c. 2nd century BCE–2nd century CE).
Seen this way, balance is not an even split of hours but an evenness of being. Work can be intense without becoming corrosive when it is not constantly interpreted as a theft from “real life.” [...]
